


Red

by Piscaria



Category: Star Trek: The Original Series
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Horror
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-15
Updated: 2014-10-15
Packaged: 2018-02-21 07:39:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,053
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2460260
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Piscaria/pseuds/Piscaria
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>The dead shambled towards him, the spreading stain of their red shirts almost obscene against the clean walls of the</i> Enterprise. <i>So many men, and a handful of women, all looking at him with blame in their eyes.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Red

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Hunter (thehunter)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thehunter/gifts).



> Thank you to lah_mrh for beta'ing this for me! Any remaining mistakes are my own.

The dead shambled towards him, the spreading stain of their red shirts almost obscene against the clean walls of the _Enterprise_. So many men, and a handful of women, lurching towards him, their mutilated bodies standing witness to the horrible ways they’d died. Burned. Poisoned. Strangled. Desiccated. Several floated towards him in a scarlet haze, mere particles of phaser dust. Yet no matter how fear or agony twisted their expressions, they all looked at him with blame in their eyes.

 _Captain_ , they called, their voices echoing eerily through the corridor. _You did this to us! We trusted you! You’re to blame!_

And they were right, he thought, sick with the truth of it. He’d led them on away missions, ordered them into danger, hesitated over his keyboard [writing letters](https://3893d280742ab2724af08ec60083ad01e3ca4d28.googledrive.com/host/0Bwx-dFSjyojiZ3JmM1RrWVF2ekk/letter.html) to their families afterward. Captain’s orders. Captain’s responsibility. 

The corridor was long, but the dead were slowly gaining on him. He spied an intercom set into the wall, but it was dead-- no amount of prodding or pounding would light it. He couldn’t reach security. But it looked like half of the security staff was already here, their uniform tunics burnt to a crisp, or spotted with acid stains, trailing into the air behind them like ghostly transporter beams. He reached for his hip, but he had no phaser. Why would he, aboard the _Enterprise_? He was going to die like they did, he thought. Alone. But not without a fight. 

Crouching, he readied his fists, swinging as the first of the dead lurched forward to greet him, his charred and blackened mouth opening, groaning, _Captain!_

But -- no! That was Spock’s voice! Kirk stared in disbelief at the security officer before him (Lieutenant Kaplan, struck by lightning on Gamma Trianguli VI), then at the approaching horde beyond, searching frantically for a blue shirt amidst the sea of red. He spotted a few, bobbing like buoys on the scarlet tide. Crewmen Darnell and Sturgeon, killed by sodium chloride extraction on M-113; Lieutenant Galway, killed by rapid aging after infection on Gamma Hydra IV; a handful of others, too far for him to make out their faces. But not Spock. _Not Spock!_ he prayed. Spock couldn’t be here. Spock had never died!

Kaplan's blistered fingers reached for him, and Kirk swung out frantically, knocking the dead man back with a solid right hook. But another (Crewman Rayburn, suffocated on Exo III) came up behind him, catching his arms. Kirk thrashed with all his might, needing to get out of here, to find Spock. He heard a voice yelling, as if from far away.

“Goddamnit, Jim, snap out of it!” 

And no, he thought, not McCoy too! They couldn’t both be here, that wasn’t -- 

Lightning-seared fingers spidered across his face, and Spock’s voice spoke, impossibly close. “My mind to your mind,” it murmured before the psi points in his mind opened and lit, a sensation like cool, clear water running through him. And suddenly Spock stood beside him, not even a glimmer of the transporter beam to mark his appearance. He lifted an eyebrow as the dead closed ranks around them.

“Terrifying,” he remarked, as calmly as he’d ever commented on one of Kirk’s chess moves. “And, of course, entirely illusory.”

“Illusion!” Kirk gasped. “It can’t be. I can see them, Spock! I can hear them! I --”

“Jim!” Spock interrupted. “Have I ever lied to you before?” His mouth quirked in the closest he usually came to a smile, and he offered his hand to Kirk, palm up. “Return with me, Captain. The ship is in danger. The crew needs you.”

The army of corpses melted away at the warm clasp of Spock's hand. Just as abruptly, the pressure of Spock's fingers against his face ceased. Kirk opened his eyes, and Kaplan’s red shirt cooled into blue, his features flowing into Spock’s familiar face. The man behind him cautiously released Kirk’s arms. Turning, he saw McCoy pick up a tricorder, frowning from the screen to Kirk. 

“The poison is still in your system, but Spock seems to have broken the hallucination. Thank God that Vulcan voodoo is good for something.” 

Kirk blinked at him, taking in McCoy’s torn sleeve and the finger-shaped bruises ringing his throat. For his part, Spock was sporting what would probably develop into an impressive black eye, green blood welling up from a cut at the top of his cheekbone. Kirk clenched his own swollen, bruised fingers in memory of the right hook he’d landed on Kaplan, then pushed the memory aside. Whatever he’d done while hallucinating, he’d make up for it later. For now, he was more concerned that the corridor was dim, lit only by the intermittent flashing of the red alert light.

"Status? The ship?” 

"It’s as we suspected,” Spock told him gravely. “The creature secreted a gaseous hallucinogen through the ship’s air vents. Fortunately, Doctor McCoy has completed an antidote.” 

“And this green-blooded bastard nearly strangled me before I could inject him with it.” 

“Really, Doctor,” Spock started, but McCoy ignored him, stepping forward to press a hypospray against Kirk’s bicep. 

“I only gave you a half dose,” he said. “A full one would have knocked you unconscious. But this should clear the rest of the poison from your system. Here.” He thrust a second hypospray into Kirk’s hand. “We’ve been injecting every man we find.”

“Hardly an ideal system,” Spock said, “but it will suffice until Mr. Scott gets the air filtration system patched.”

“Good work,” Kirk told them, readying the hypospray. “Let’s split up. It will be more efficient.”

A scream echoed through the Jeffries tube overhead, and suiting word to deed, Kirk hoisted himself up the service ladder, into the tube. His hand hit something wet and sticky, and he glanced down, wincing to find one of the engineering ensigns -- Bishop, Kirk thought his name was -- bleeding from a messy crack across his head. 

“Bones!” Kirk yelled, hoping the doctor would hear. Shifting the hypospray, he crawled forward. 

Several meters ahead of him, a shadow crouched, panting heavily. “Stay back!” he snarled, raising a length of conduit piping in a warning. 

For a moment, Kirk's vision swam. It almost looked like Bishop crouched in front of him, blood dripping sluggishly down his face and from the end of the pipe. His shirt was red.

The End


End file.
